For Summer Schmit, Mix Of Newcomers, Paralympians Is All Part Of The Appeal At Jimi Flowers Classic

The annual Jimi Flowers Classic is a highlight on the calendar each year for many U.S. Para swimmers. 

Part of the appeal, said Summer Schmit, a two-time Paralympian who competed in this year’s meet that was held over Labor Day weekend, is simply gathering at the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado. The altitude makes racing a great challenge, and it’s inspiring to be where so many Olympic and Paralympic legends have come before. 

What makes the meet truly special, though, is the mix of athletes it brings together. Seasoned Paralympians share the pool with young swimmers just starting their Paralympic careers in a relaxed, low-stakes competitive environment where everyone can learn and interact with one another.  

“This year, especially, there were so many new swimmers there, which was super exciting to see,” said Schmit, 22, from Stillwater, Minnesota. “Before the meet started they had a little meet and greet with a bunch of us who are Paralympians, so we got to meet a bunch of new up-and-coming swimmers, which was so much fun. We got to answer some of their questions, and it was so cool to see how excited they were, how fresh-faced. It reminded me of my first meet. I really do love seeing that developmental aspect of the sport at competitions like this.”  

The meet honors Jimi Flowers, whose long association with USA Swimming and U.S. Paralympics Swimming included time as the national team director and resident team coach. Known as a positive and energetic leader, Flowers died tragically in 2009 after a climbing accident.  

Among the competitors at this year’s meet were Schmit and fellow Paralympians Julia Gaffney, Morgan Ray, Taylor Winnett and Grace Nuhfer, as well as up-and-comers including Gray Rutledge and Kenley Teller. They shared the pool deck with swimmers as young as nine years old, with many others in the 11 to 13 age range.  

“The Para world is just so new to most of them, so (a lot of the questions) were about the classification system and how that works,” said Schmit, who was born with a congenital disarticulation of the right wrist and without a right hand. “I talked to one mom about how you never know who’s actually winning (in the open class meets) because everyone’s a different classification, so it’s not who touches first wins. That’s a learning curve coming into Para. But just really answering questions about the Paralympics in general.” 

It’s been a year since Schmit competed in her second Paralympic Games in Paris, and this summer she’s spending six weeks at the USOPTC. In addition to bonding over how hard it is to breathe one mile above sea level, she and her teammates who’ve also been training there have enjoyed group hikes in the mountains and even went to the Gracie Abrams concert at Red Rocks Amphitheatere outside Denver.  

“My first ever concert,” Schmit said.  

Schmit graduated last year from the University of Minnesota ahead of schedule and has since been training with her hometown club team, the St. Croix Swim Club in Stillwater while working on her Master’s in Applied Linguistics for Language Teaching online through England’s University of Oxford. She hopes to teach English as a second language full-time once her swimming career is over. 

“I was undecided about what I wanted to do for so long, but I come from a family of educators,” she said. “My mom is a Spanish teacher and my dad’s a school counselor, so I was very aware of teaching. Then I minored in Spanish in undergrad, so having that background really opened my eyes to helping people learn English. 

“There are a lot of Spanish-speaking immigrants in the Twin Cities area near where I live, and I got to do a mini-internship with middle schoolers, and I loved it so much. I just knew that was what I wanted to do, that I’d found my calling, as cheesy as that sounds.”  

Even with all her experience now, Schmit still remembers her first Para swim meet. It was in 2015, at the Fred Lamback Paralympic Swimming Open in Georgia, and she was a newcomer to Para swimming at just 12 years old.  

“And I met some of my friends who I’m still good friends with to this day,” she said. “I also remember meeting (now three-time Paralympian) Hannah Aspden and getting her autograph on a T-shirt. I was totally starstruck and thought it was the coolest thing ever. Years later I was her teammate and she was captain at the Paralympics, so it was super fun to see that come full circle. Hopefully it’ll happen with some of the kids we just saw (at the Jimi Flowers meet).” 

Karen Price is a reporter from Pittsburgh who has covered Olympic and Paralympic sports for various publications. She is a freelance contributor to USParaSwimming.org on behalf of Red Line Editorial, Inc.